Arusha

Arusha , city (1994 est. pop. 140,000), capital of Arusha prov., NE Tanzania. It is an industrial and administrative center, connected by rail with Tanga on the Indian Ocean and with Kenya. Manufactures include textiles, beverages, processed foods, plastics, and electronic equipment. The city was the headquarters of the East African Community (founded 1967) until it was disbanded in 1977; the secretariat of the East African Co-operation, which evolved into a new East African Community by 2000, was established there in 1996. In Jan., 1967, President Julius Nyerere of Tanzania issued the influential Arusha Declaration, which called for socialism, hard work, and self-reliance in Tanzania. Arusha is the site of an institute devoted to research in tropical pesticides.

Arusha Declaration (Tanzania) A programme developed in 1967 by Nyerere, which sought to adapt the principles of socialism to the conditions of Tanzania. Taking the communal life of the Arusha tribe as a model, the village (Ujamaa) was to be the country's principal administrative, productive, and political unit. All capital stock and properties were owned by the village. The aims of this policy were to increase the country's economic self-sufficiency and reduce its dependence on agricultural imports, and to establish equality of individual income. At the same time its aims were moral: to encourage self-sacrifice and community spirit. It did bring about a greater equality of income, but failed to increase agricultural production, which suffered from a lack of personal incentive to increase yields.

Arusha Declaration (1967) A major policy statement by President Nyerere of TANZANIA. The text was agreed by the executive of the political party TANU (Tanganyika African National Union) and proposed that TANU implement a socialist programme by which the major means of production would be placed under the collective ownership of the farmers and workers of the country. No party member would be allowed more than one salary or to own more than one house, nor any capitalist stocks and shares. Banks were nationalized, followed by large industrial and insurance companies, as well as the larger trading firms. Nyerere was deeply committed to the concept of ujamaa, which saw all land and natural resources as belonging to the people within their village communities, and following the declaration there emerged many farm collectives. The policy was moderated after 1977 to allow some private investment, and largely abandoned after 1987.